From the personal experience of buying it a handful of times, Terminator 2 Judgment Day has about four handfuls of different covers. Depending upon if you got it on VHS, DVD, Blu-ray, maybe even HD DVD when that was a thing, but most beautifully done and a blast from the past is this Japanese LaserDisc version.
I don’t really have any insight on the packaging other than the graphic design job of the cover here is a screenshot from when the Terminator splits off from John. Basically they’re at Skynet about to be busted as a whole Fleet of cops roll up, John says something about not killing anyone and the Terminator looks back with a sly look on his face replying, “trust me”. It plays off of conversation they had earlier in the movie where John asked the Terminator to swear that he wouldn’t kill anyone, to which John repeats before this, “Hey wait, you swore!” basically the background of the image adds to the psychological aspect of what kind of control the Terminator has at that point of the film.
So what is it about the image technically, say from the point of Photoshop that makes it so good? Well I think the fact that it’s so simple makes it that much more powerful. It’s not a collage like Star Wars, it’s not a work of typography like the Alien logo, the simple layering effects here do the heavy lifting. So the image is taken, added is a little bit of grain or noise, adjust the black and white levels after desaturation of colors, maybe add a light green and grayish color layer to multiply over, mask subtle highlighting eyes with a contrasting red and it’s perfect. Can’t say I would have ever come up with this myself, but I feel like I have to point out amazing artwork when I see it. And considering it’s just an edited still from a shot in the film, it’s very well done.
I love the movie, I’ve maybe watched it more than any other movie… besides possibly The Matrix but it’s designs like these that are worthy to hang on the wall. If you can ever find it.
